*** {start comment 154-2}
One suspects that the Pink Swastika authors have relied for
their psychological information on Dr. Charles Socarides, whose
help they acknowledge (see the acknowledgements at the front of
the book). If so, they should have had the courtesy to include a
note saying he was their source instead of trying to blame Adam
for what they say. One person, Allen Young, is mentioned as
referring to a faction of psychiatrists as "war criminals." What
is covered up is the existence of another group of psychiatrists
who supported the gays in their effort to change the APA's
wording on homosexuality. A leader of the faction favoring the
status quo was Socarides, and it is Socarides who demanded the
mentioned referendum. The change of wording taking homosexuality
off the list of disorders went through the normal APA procedure.
The Socarides referendum was abnormal. Why do the Pink Swastika
authors cover up the role of the Socarides faction in all this?
Enrique Rueda is not an "historian" and doesn't claim to be
one. The credit in his book states, "Enrique Rueda is Director
of the Catholic Center at the Free Congress Research and
Education Foundation {a right-wing group}. A native of Cuba, he
was imprisoned by the Communists during the Bay of Pigs
invasion. He holds a Master of Arts degree in Political Science
from Fordham University, and advanced degrees in Divinity and
Theology from St. Joseph's Seminary."
The myth that the APA succumbed to pressure and caved in to
demands by homosexuals out of fear is debunked in Ronald Bayer's
book, Homosexuality and American Psychiatry: The Politics of
Diagnosis (Basic Books 1981). The demonstrations were
unfortunately needed to get the psychiatric establishment to
address the issue, but the APA moved through its normal channels
in evaluating new research by psychological researchers such as
Evelyn Hooker, whose pioneering work had shown that contrary to
the belief widely held by the psychiatric establishment, their
tests could not tell homosexuals apart from heterosexuals,
indicating there were no basic differences except for sexuality.
The process is best characterized by Bayer's account of the
"conversion" of Robert Spitzer of the New York State Psychiatric
Institute, who was a member of the APA's Committee on
Nomenclature, the group that had the primary responsibility for
deciding the issue. The effort began (page 117) with
presentations to the Nomenclature Committee by a number of
prominent psychological investigators such as Seymour Halleck, a
psychiatrist widely acknowledged as a critic of the abuse of
psychiatric authority, Wardell Pomeroy, a colleague of Dr.
Alfred Kinsey, and Alan Bell of the Institute for Sex Research
at Indiana University. A presentation to the Nomenclature
Committee on February 8, 1973, included "an impressive array of
citations which indicated that the classification of
homosexuality was inconsistent with a scientific perspective."
(p118) After reviewing the research that questioned the accepted
position on homosexuality, a presentation was made of the
consequences of the current classification as a disorder,
showing the way in which it was being used to discriminate
unreasonably against gays. Finally, "the Nomenclature Committee
was pressed to consider the psychological havoc that resulted
from the labeling of the homosexual preference as pathological."
(p119)
"Nothing impressed the members of the Committee on
Nomenclature more than the sober and professional manner in
which the homosexual case was presented to them. After several
years of impassioned denunciations and disruptions, here, at
last, was a statement that could be assimilated, analyzed, and
discussed in a scientific context." (A report is available in
the New York Times of February 9.)
The notorious homophobic psychoanalysts Irving Bieber and
Charles Socarides, whose practices centered on their alleged
ability to cure homosexuality, immediately organized an attempt
to stop any possible declassification of homosexuality as a
disorder and rallied opposition among psychoanalysts. While the
psychoanalysts worked to stop any change, support for the change
was beginning to appear among local APA branches. In March 1973
the Northern New England District Branch of the APA became the
first to endorse deletion of homosexuality from the list of
disorders. Soon after APA's Area Council I, which included all
of New England as well as Ontario and Quebec called for the
change (page 123).
Robert Spitzer at first had been against dropping
homosexuality from the list of disorders. "Certainly he was not
at first a supporter of the effort to delete homosexuality from
the nomenclature. Indeed, when paired with Paul Wilson, a
psychiatrist from Washington, D.C., to draft a discussion paper
for the committee, Spitzer could not accept Wilson's version
because of its support for declassification. What is remarkable
is that because of his sense of mission he was, despite his
unformed views, able to dominate both the pace and the direction
of the committee's work. In fact it was Spitzer's own conceptual
struggle with the issue of homosexuality that framed the
committee's considerations." (Page 124)
"By the time of the May 1973 APA convention in Honolulu,
Spitzer's views had moved quite far. The justification for
including homosexuality per se among the psychiatric disorders
had become increasingly inconsistent with his understanding of
the appropriate focus of a nosological system. His attention had
been drawn to critical analyses of standard psychoanalytic works
like Bieber's and to empirical studies indicating that
homosexuals were quite capable of satisfactory adjustments to
the demands of everyday life. Contact with gay activists made it
clear that many homosexuals were fully satisfied with their
sexual orientations. It began to seem to him the inclusion of
homosexuality in DSM-II constituted an unjustifiable extension
of the concept of 'psychiatric disorder.': {DSM-II is the
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Psychiatric Disorders, its
second issue. The dispute was about removing homosexuality from
that book.}(page 124)
The account goes on to relate that a gay activist took
Spitzer to a meeting at the convention of gay psychiatrists.
When the psychiatrists noticed Spitzer's presence, they were
outraged, for they had to fear that if he would betray their gay
status to their institutions they would lose their jobs and face
repercussions in their families and elsewhere. Many insisted
that Spitzer leave but in the end he was allowed to stay. "The
occasion not only succeeded in substantiating Spitzer's belief
that being homosexual had little to do with one's capacity to
function at a high level, but perhaps more importantly provided
an emotional jolt that moved him to prepare, within a month, a
proposal for the deletion of homosexuality from the
nomenclature."(page 126)
Thereafter the change worked its way through the normal
route of APA committees until it won final approval. The only
further "political" action on the part of gays was a letter
written in support of the change to the APA's Council of
Research and Development. Bayer says (p 131) "Written with
extraordinary attentiveness to the sensibilities and
professional prerogatives of those who would be making the
crucial decision, it sought in almost deferential terms to avoid
the impression that pressure was being brought to bear upon
them." The Council unanimously approved the change as written by
Spitzer. Next the Assembly of District Branches approved it by
an overwhelming majority. This was especially heartening because
the Assembly tends to reflect a clinical rather than an academic
perspective in psychiatry, and resistance to the deletion had
been anticipated.(page 134) After passage by the Reference
Committee, the deletion was finally approved by the board of
trustees, who first heard the objections of Bieber, Socarides
and Robert McDevitt. Some members of the board were reluctant to
make the change, feeling privately that homosexuality was indeed
a disorder, but nevertheless acknowledging that the evidence
required to substantiate that position was lacking. After a
first vote for passage of nine in favor, four against, and two
abstaining, a change to make the wording more tentative resulted
in thirteen votes for deletion, with two abstentions.
A movement to reverse the board's action immediately
started, and the Socarides group demanded a referendum of the
membership on it. That was quite an extraordinary thing. "That a
decision presented as being based upon the scientific
examination of the standards that should apply to the
classification of psychiatric disorders would be subject to
ratification in a democratic vote of America's psychiatrists
astonished many observers. It suggested that psychiatry's claim
that it constituted a clinical science like other branches of
medicine was at best a self-deception."(page 142)
The APA leadership gave in to Socarides's demand for the
referendum, but also worked to defend its decision and encourage
the membership to support the change. Here the final political
involvement of the gay community occurred. It succeeded in
getting all the candidates for the APA presidency to sign
letters urging the membership to approve the change. The
National Gay Task Force also underwrote the full cost of the
mailing, about $2,500. If there is any criticism due on this
issue, it is because "a decision was made not to indicate on the
letter that it was written, at least in part, by the Gay Task
Force, nor to reveal that its distribution was funded by
contributions the Task Force had raised. Indeed, the letter gave
every indication of having been conceived and mailed by those
who signed it."(146)
"Since a public solicitation of financial support had been
made, though presumably to those sympathetic to the gay cause,
it is not surprising that information regarding the role of the
NGTF surfaced quickly."(p 146) The Socarides group raised
further objections, but the referendum result was that 58% of
the 10,000 psychiatrists who participated supported the change,
while 37% voted against it, the remainder abstaining or not
voting.
That is the story of the APA decision as Bayer tells it.
It's been related here at such length because of the reckless
charges that continue to be made that it was a purely political
decision, not a scientific one, and that it was made in response
to threats of violence. Nothing could be further from the truth.
*** {end comment 154-2}
